(The listings for Washington, California, and Virginia sites are speculative, based on the questionable assumption that the posting locations listed in DND's description of the 291 trade are accurate and up-to-date.)

Friday, May 27, 2005

Question du jour: CFIOG Support Dets?

The Communication Reserve Development Plan 2004-2009 (PDF file) reported that "CFIOG has proposed that the IO support capabilities within the Communication Reserve be expanded by developing the Communicator Research Operator (R291) trade within the reserves and by standing up CFIOG Support Dets at CFIOG HQ Ottawa and in Halifax, Victoria, and Winnipeg", i.e., at MARLANT, MARPAC, and AIRCOM headquarters, where there already are Cryptologic Support Elements from the Reg Force. A team was to be set up no later than August 2003 to report by March 2004 on a number of outstanding issues related to these proposals, including "the financial options for expansion of the IO support capabilities within the Communication Reserve to include CFIOG Support Dets" and "Command and Control for the proposed CFIOG Support Dets in Ottawa, Halifax, Victoria and Winnipeg".

The plan to create the R291 trade is going ahead. Question: What, if anything, has been decided with respect to the CFIOG Support Dets?

Tuesday, May 24, 2005

Canadian SIGINT sites past and present

Here’s a list I’m working on of the main Canadian SIGINT operating sites past and present and their years of operation. The information that I’ve seen on the Second World War sites tends to be spotty, so a lot of the dates associated with those are guesses. I hope to get better information on those and other stations as time goes by. Any suggestions readers can make for additions, corrections, etc would be gratefully received!

Canadian SIGINT sites past and present

Location

Years of operation

Aklavik, Northwest Territories (RCN)

1949 - 1961

Alert, Nunavut (RCAF/RCCS/SRS/CFIOG)

1956 - present

Amherst, Nova Scotia (RCCS)

1941 - 1942

Augsburg, Germany (SRS detachment)

1989 - 1992?

Bermuda (RCN/SRS)

1963 - 1993

Botwood, Newfoundland (DOT)

1939? - 1945?

Cap D’Espoir, Quebec (RCN @ RCAF)

1941 - 1945?

Churchill, Manitoba (RCN/SRS)

1948 - 1968

Coal Harbour, British Columbia (RCN @ RCAF)

1941 - 1942

Coverdale, New Brunswick (RCN/SRS)

1944 - 1971

Darwin, Australia: McMillan’s Road Camp (RCCS)

1945 - 1945

Esquimalt, British Columbia (RCN intercept for RN)

1925 - 1940?

Esquimalt, British Columbia (MARPAC support element)

? - present

Flin Flon, Manitoba (AFTAC only?)

1959? - ?

Forrest, Manitoba (DOT)

1940 - 1942

Fort Chimo (now Kuujjuaq), Quebec (RCN)

1949 - 1952

Frobisher Bay (now Iqaluit), Nunavut (RCN)

1953 - 1967

Gander, Newfoundland (RCN/SRS/CFIOG)

1940 - present

Gloucester, Ontario (RCN HF-DF/training/admin site)

1943 - 1972

Gordon Head, British Columbia (RCN)

1940 - 1945

Grande Prairie, Alberta (RCCS)

1942 - 1947

Halifax, Nova Scotia (MARLANT support element)

? - present

Harbour Grace, Newfoundland (RCN)

1940? - 1945?

Hartlen Point, Nova Scotia (DOT)

1941? - 1945?

Inuvik, NWT (RCN/SRS)

1961 - 1986

Kingston, Ontario (SRS/CFIOG training)

1972 - present

Kingston, Ontario (2 EW Sqn of 1 CSR/1CDHSR/CFJSR)

? - present

Kingston, Ontario (Res EW Sqn/772 EW Sqn)

1986 - present

Ladner, British Columbia (RCCS/SRS)

1949 - 1971

Leitrim, Ontario (RCCS/SRS/CFIOG)

1941 - present

Louisbourg, Nova Scotia (DOT)

1939 - 1945?

Lulu Island, British Columbia (DOT)

1945 - 1945

Masset, British Columbia (RCN/SRS/CFIOG)

1944 - 1945 and 1949 - present

Ottawa, Ontario (various headquarters)

1939 - present

Ottawa, Ontario (DOT)

1939 - 1945?

Ottawa, Ontario (771 CRS)

1987 - 2002

Pennfield, New Brunswick (RCN @ RCAF)

1941? - 1944?

Point Grey, British Columbia (DOT)

1940 - 1945?

Portage la Prairie, Manitoba (RCN @ RCAF)

1942? - 1945?

Prince Rupert, British Columbia (RCN)

1946? - 1948?

Riske Creek, British Columbia (RCCS; never operational)

1944 - 1946

Rivers, Manitoba (RCN @ RCAF)

1941? - 1945?

Rockcliffe, Ontario (RCCS)

1939 – 1941

Shediac, New Brunswick (DOT)

1939 - 1945?

St. Hubert, Quebec (DOT)

1939 - 1945?

Ste. Hyacinthe, Quebec (training)

1944 - 1945?

Strathburn, Ontario (DOT)

1939 - 1945?

Sydney, Nova Scotia (RCN @ RCAF)

1941? - 1945?

Ucluelet, British Columbia (RCN @ RCAF)

1941 - 1942

Victoria, British Columbia (RCCS)

1942 - 1949

Whitehorse, Yukon Territory (RCAF/SRS)

1948?- 1968

Winnipeg, Manitoba (DOT)

1942 - 1945

Winnipeg, Manitoba (AIRCOM support element)

? - present

The list does not include the various operating sites of the Special Wireless Sections Type “A” and Type “B” in Britain, Italy, and North-West Europe from 1941 to 1945 or similar operations that may have taken place in the years since the Second World War when Canadian forces have been operationally deployed. Also not included are the covert intercept sites reported to operate in some Canadian embassies and consulates.

Canadians are also posted to a number of U.S. sites under the CF-USN Personnel Exchange Program. Currently, these sites include Fort Meade, MD; Kunia RSOC, HI; Medina RSOC, TX; and possibly San Diego, CA; Norfolk, VA; and Whidbey Island, WA. At various times, Canadians have also been posted to other U.S. sites under this program, including Northwest, VA; Homestead, FL; Skaggs Island, CA; Imperial Beach, CA; Wahiawa, HI; and Naval Security Group Headquarters (Washington, DC).

Friday, May 20, 2005

John L. Adams to be next CSE Chief

As of 1 July 2005 the Communications Security Establishment will have a new Chief. On 18 May 2005 Prime Minister Martin announced the appointment of John L. Adams as the next Chief of CSE. Adams will replace the current Chief, Keith Coulter, who will retire at the end of June.

Adams spent most of his career in the Canadian army and is currently Associate Deputy Minister of Fisheries and Oceans and Commissioner of the Canadian Coast Guard. More information can be found in his online bio, including the intriguing news that he holds a Master of Phil Barnesosophy degree from Oxford University (an obscure field, but—who knows?—maybe it will come in handy).

Unlike previous CSE Chiefs, Adams is being appointed "Associate Deputy Minister of National Defence, where his role will be to serve as Chief of the Communications Security Establishment". Will all future CSE Chiefs be appointed to this position or is this something specific for this officeholder? Born in 1942, Adams is presumably only a few years away from retirement, so it probably won't be too long before we find out.

John Adams will be the 7th Chief CSE/Director CBNRC in the agency's 59-year history:

Wednesday, May 18, 2005

This date in history: 1 CSWG took over operations in Darwin

On this date in history, 18 May 1945, 1 Canadian Special Wireless Group took over operations at McMillan's Road Camp in Darwin, Australia. Numbering 325 personnel all ranks, 1 CSWG operated at Darwin from 30 April 1945 until 11 October 1945, working at first in conjunction with the Australian Special Wireless Group before taking over operation of the station.

Photo by Don Vaughan-Smith courtesy of Jim Troyanek

The unit intercepted approximately 1200 messages (70,000 code groups) a day, forwarding the traffic to the US-Australian Central Bureau in Brisbane, and later to Manila. A number of members of 1 CSWG's Intelligence Section also worked at Central Bureau and/or Manila during the unit's time in Australia.

By all indications, the Canadians did excellent work. According to Central Bureau,

The Canadian Special Wireless Group at Darwin has been doing a magnificent job continuously in all its contacts with us. They have increased the totals of traffic copied, improved the standard of the teletype service, and turned in a much finer grade of traffic than we have ever before received from any other station. At the present time they are sending us between 1000 and 1200 messages daily over the teletype and the quality of these is such (90% accuracy) that results are about 20% better than those from any of our other stations.

Tuesday, May 17, 2005

This date in history: BRUSA signed

On this date in history, 17 May 1943, the BRUSA agreement was signed by Britain and the United States. The direct forerunner of the 1946 BRUSA agreement (which was renamed the UKUSA agreement in 1954), the 1943 agreement formalized wartime communications intelligence cooperation between Britain's Government Code and Cipher School (later known as GCHQ) and the U.S. Army's Signal Security Agency. The "Holden agreement" of 2 October 1942, also a forerunner of the UKUSA agreement, had earlier laid out the parameters of British-American naval COMINT cooperation.

The text and appendices of the BRUSA agreement were released to the public in 1995 and were published in the journal Cryptologia in 1997 ("The BRUSA Agreement of May 17, 1943," Cryptologia, vol. 21, no. 1 (Jan. 1997): 30-38).

Thursday, May 12, 2005

This date in history: XU approved

On this date in history, 12 May 1941, the Interdepartmental Committee on Cryptography met in the East Block of Parliament Hill and approved the establishment of Canada's first code-breaking agency, the Examination Unit (XU). The Committee decided that the XU would be headed by Herbert O. Yardley, with the unit's policy and operations controlled by the Department of External Affairs. Present at the meeting were Hugh Keenleyside of the Department of External Affairs, Chairman of the Committee; Captain Eric S. Brand, Director of Naval Intelligence; Lieutenant C. Herbert Little of the RCN's Foreign Intelligence Section; Lieutenant Colonel William W. Murray, Director of Military Intelligence; Tommy A. Stone of the Department of External Affairs; Herbert Yardley; and "Miss Geary", sitting in for C. J. (Jack) Mackenzie, the President of the National Research Council.

The XU began operations in June 1941 with a staff of nine. It was housed in rooms 202 and 203 of the NRC Annex, located on Montreal Road.

The photo above shows the XU staff, then about 20-25 strong, in front of the NRC Annex in mid-1942. By the time this photo was taken, Yardley had already been replaced by GC&CS cryptanalyst Oliver Strachey (third row from front, second from left). Strachey was replaced by another British cryptanalyst, F. A. (Tony) Kendrick, in July 1942.

Wednesday, May 11, 2005

Reserve EW Squadron re-established as 772 EW Squadron

The Reserve Electronic Warfare Squadron was re-established as 772 Electronic Warfare Squadron, under the command of 70 Communication Group, on 7 April 2005. According to DND's 2005-06 Report on Plans and Priorities, 772 EW Squadron will be staffed by "a cadre of Reserve communicator research operators" (i.e., the reserve force equivalent of the regular force 291 trade). "This new trade is currently undergoing the Occupation Specification Implementation Process."

Created in 1986 and based in Kingston, Ontario, the Reserve Electronic Warfare Squadron was under the direct command of the CFSRS/CFIOG from 1994 until 2005. More information about the Reserve Electronic Warfare Squadron/772 EW Squadron is available at the Reserve Electronic Warfare Squadron Association website.

Tuesday, May 10, 2005

Growth continues at CSE

As noted in a recent post (Coulter speaks: CSE builds), CSE is projected to grow to a staff of 1546 "full-time equivalents" in fiscal year 2005-06. The graph below shows the evolution of CSE's staffing from its origins in 1946 (then known as the Communications Branch of the National Research Council, or CBNRC) to the present.

As the graph demonstrates, CSE is now in the midst of the third, and largest, buildup in its history. The first buildup occurred during the early days of the Cold War in the late 1940s and 1950s. The second dates to the renewed Cold War tensions of the 1980s (and to the surge in global communications traffic that began in the 1970s and continues to this day). The third is evidently primarily a response to the events of September 11th, 2001.

This date in history: Herbert O. Yardley

On this date in history, 10 May 1941, Herbert Osborn Yardley came to Ottawa to discuss setting up Canada's first code-breaking organization, the Examination Unit (XU). Yardley was an American citizen who had worked as a code-breaker for the U.S. Army during the First World War and subsequently headed the United States' first peacetime code-breaking organization, MI-8. Left out of work when MI-8 was shut down in 1929, in 1931 he wrote a book about his code-breaking exploits, The American Black Chamber, that to the consternation of the U.S. government quickly became an international bestseller.

The Canadian government recruited Yardley to run the XU at the suggestion of the U.S. Army's Chief Signal Officer, Major General Joseph Mauborgne. The XU began operations under Yardley's direction on 9 June 1941, focusing initially on Vichy French codes, German agent traffic, and Japanese diplomatic messages. Unfortunately for Yardley, however, it very soon was made clear to Ottawa that neither the U.S. government (despite Mauborgne's recommendation of Yardley) nor the British government had any intention of co-operating with Canada on code-breaking as long as the author of The American Black Chamber was associated with the effort. In December 1941 Yardley was shown the door. He was replaced by British-supplied cryptanalyst Oliver Strachey in January 1942.

Sunday, May 08, 2005

CFIOG birthday

Sixty-seven years ago today, on 8 May 1938, Minister of National Defence the Hon. Ian Alistair Mackenzie approved the creation of a "Tri-Service Wireless Intelligence Service". The road that ultimately led to the Canadian Forces Information Operations Group (CFIOG) of today included a number of twists and turns: aside from the Joint Discrimination Unit, which operated from 1943 to 1946, the separate service SIGINT organizations operated largely independently of each other until the creation of the Canadian Forces Supplementary Radio System (CFSRS) in 1966. The CFSRS then became the CFIOG in 1998. But May 8th is considered to be the official birth date of the CFIOG, so Happy Birthday CFIOG!

We have a campus of facilities. My office is in the old CBC building at 1500 Bronson Street. We have, on Heron Road, a major foreign intelligence complex. We have another building, soon to be two more, going up, because we are growing on that campus. We are working with Public Works and Treasury Board on a longer-term solution. The plan is, by the fall, to have a government approved, long-term accommodation plan for CSE. We have been adding buildings out on our campus because we needed floor space in a hurry.

The old CBC building, now called the Edward Drake Building (after CSE's first chief), is the Y-shaped building to the right of centre in this photo. The Heron Road complex is the L-shaped building (Sir Leonard Tilley Building) and the adjacent square building ("Annex") located to the left of centre. The building under construction is not shown on the photo (which probably was taken in 2003 or 2004). The need for new accommodations is undoubtedly related to the rapid growth that CSE has undergone in recent years. The agency had a staff of about 900 in 1997, when it acquired the Drake Building. In fiscal year 2005-06 it is projected to have a staff of 1546.

Stations of the past: HMCS Coverdale

National Archives of Canada photo PA204141

HMCS Coverdale, located just south of Moncton, New Brunswick, was an intercept and high-frequency direction-finding station from (approx.) 1944 until 1971, when operations were transferred to 770 Communications Research Squadron at CFB Gander.

During the Second World War the station was staffed by the Women's Royal Canadian Naval Service and used primarily to monitor and track U-Boats. After the war, the station served as Alternate Net Control Station for the joint US-Canadian Atlantic HF-DF net, tracking Soviet instead of German submarines, as well as other North Atlantic sea and air traffic.

Jerry Proc's HMCS Coverdale webpage is an outstanding resource on the wartime and post-war operations at Coverdale, the equipment and facilities at the station, and the people who served there.

Friday, May 06, 2005

New book: Chatter

Chatter provides an easy-to-read and entertaining overview of the UKUSA SIGINT alliance, the privacy and security issues surrounding SIGINT, and the people who in various ways make it their mission to watch the SIGINT listeners. Be warned, however: the book provides very little new information on the SIGINT world and essentially nothing on Canada's role in that world.

In the introduction to the book Keefe advances what he calls the SIGINT Postulate: "there is an inverse proportion between how much a person is willing to talk about signals intelligence and how much he or she actually knows." As one who has frequently talked about it and who even has a blog about it fer cryin' out loud, I'd have to say Keefe is pretty close to the truth on that score. But, hey, he wrote a whole book about it, and occasionally the SIGINT Postulate shows there too. The United States has about 100 spy satellites in orbit? No, no, no. US photoreconnaissance satellites operate in molniya orbits? Gimme a break.

"Gotchas" like these are of very little importance, of course. A more substantive critique is that the book does a better job of raising questions than it does of answering them, or even of pointing towards the glimmer of possible answers. On the whole, however, it's well worth the read.

Thursday, May 05, 2005

A mystery wrapped in an Enigma?

The keys are punched, the rotors turn, the lamps light up, and out of the reshuffled wiring comes a new organization chart and a new set of alphabetical designators for CSE's groups.

Presumably there are good reasons behind CSE's frequent reorganizations, not just an inclination to encipher the organization chart every now and then. But to CSE's oft-shuffled employees the process sometimes must feel like being trapped in an Enigma machine.

By my estimate, CSE has undergone major reorganizations at least nine times in its short post-war existence, on average at least once every six years. It reorganized three times in the five years between 1995 and 2000. Throw in the 1998 transformation of the Supplementary Radio System into the Canadian Forces Information Operations Group, and for a while there the CSE staff must have needed a Bombe just to figure out who was who.

The most recent reorganization that I am aware of took place on 5 September 2000, when the organization shown below was established. I'd be surprised if there hasn't been at least one other reorganization since.

Wednesday, May 04, 2005

Overhead intel on Leitrim

Google Maps' new satellite photos feature provides a detailed and apparently reasonably up to date (probably 2003 or 2004) look at CFS Leitrim, Canada's main SIGINT collection site, located just south of Ottawa.

Here's a close-up look at the buildings. You can see the two new satellite dishes added in 2003, one on the west end of the line of radomes and the other on the east end. Interestingly, neither dish has yet been covered by a radome of its own (as of the time this photo was taken, anyway).

You can also zoom out a bit for a look at the whole station. Note the Pusher high-frequency direction-finding antenna array, codenamed CENTREVELIC, located just north of the buildings (shown in more detail here). Also interesting is the landscaping done in the 1960s for a considerably larger HF-DF array a short distance to the north-west of the Pusher array. As far as I can tell, this array, possibly intended to be an AN/FLR-9, was never built, and the site is gradually reverting back to nature.

Finally, the Google images provide evidence of another—even larger—type of circularly disposed array at the station. Note the two semi-circular fans radiating out from the vicinity of the station buildings, one fan north of Leitrim Road and the other south of the road. The change in vegetation makes their outlines easily apparent. A close-up look at the southern fan makes some of the structural details visible. Anyone know what kind of array this is? I'm guessing it's a series of vertical log periodic antennas strung between towers and oriented at 15-degree intervals from each other to form a semi-circle. But that's a guess, and not what I would call an informed one, either.

[Update 7 October 2008: Well, it turns out I was right—about it not being an informed guess. I did a drive-past in August and there are no LPAs in the new array. Jerry Proc has some details of the rhombic arrays formerly at the station and the decision to replace them with the new system on his Leitrim - Old Antennas page.]

[Update 27 May 2009: Should have updated this about six months ago. The new array is known as a Beverage rosette array. The ever-reliable Jerry Proc has the details on his Leitrim - Current HF Antennas page.]

Canada, SIGINT, and this blog

This blog is about Canada's signals intelligence (SIGINT) activities, past and present, including Canadian participation in the global UKUSA SIGINT alliance.Signals Intelligence was defined by the Canadian government in 1977 as "all processes involved in, and information and technical material derived from, the interception and study of foreign communications and non-communications electromagnetic emissions." Subcategories of SIGINT include intelligence derived from communications, also known as Communications Intelligence (COMINT); intelligence derived from non-communications emissions such as radar, also known as Electronics Intelligence (ELINT); and intelligence derived from the telemetry transmissions of missiles or other equipment undergoing testing, also known as Telemetry Intelligence (TELINT). In 2001, the range of potential Canadian SIGINT targets was formally broadened to incorporate data or technical information carried on, contained in, or relating to the electromagnetic emissions, communications systems, information technology systems, and networks that comprise the "global information infrastructure" when obtained for the purpose of providing foreign intelligence.

The Communications Security Establishment (CSE) is Canada's national Signals Intelligence organization. Formerly a civilian agency of the Department of National Defence, in November 2011 CSE became a separate agency of the government of Canada. CSE processes SIGINT, produces analyses, and disseminates reports to Canadian and allied intelligence clients. The collection of SIGINT is conducted primarily by the Canadian Forces Information Operations Group (CFIOG), formerly the Canadian Forces Supplementary Radio System (CFSRS), a component of the Canadian Armed Forces that operates under the direction of CSE for SIGINT purposes. CSE and the CFIOG in turn work in close co-operation with the US National Security Agency (NSA), Britain's Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), Australia's Defence Signals Directorate (DSD), and New Zealand's Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) in a global intelligence alliance known informally as the UKUSA community.

The purpose of this blog is to collect, compile, analyse, and discuss publicly available information about the Communications Security Establishment and SIGINT activities in general. I have never had any role, direct or indirect, in the SIGINT business, and I consider myself neither a critic of nor an advocate for the Canadian agencies involved in these activities. A certain amount of secrecy is essential to the operations of these agencies. Nonetheless, a greater level of public knowledge about the privacy and national security issues raised by signals intelligence activities, and about the SIGINT agencies in general, would, in my view, be a good thing. My primary motivation in pursuing this topic, however, is simply to satisfy my own curiosity about the business of signals intelligence and Canada's role in it.

[Updated 16 January 2012: Since November 2011, CSE has been a separate agency of the government of Canada.]